The Weyrlingmaster Drabbles
by Snowfilly
Summary: 52 drabbles about a Weyrlingmaster of the 9th Pass: his classes, life, Fall and his brown Ralenth. Updating monthly.
1. Febuary

Disclaimer – Settings and some characters are the property of Anne McCaffrey and I am making no profit from their use.

Dedicated to the memory of Dave Benson: writer, teacher, roleplayer, DM, lover of dragons, friend. Gone far too soon.

Joy

M'rand never enjoys Hatching days. He has his favourites and brown Ralenth has his and following the Impression is something close to agony. F'lar watches, Lessa watches, Robinton watches but they never see it how this pair have to.

The boy who half turns away from his brown in the first seconds. The man who gathers his blue into his arms, buries his head in the joint between body and wings to hide his shame. An imperious new bronze rider, pushing a green out of the way as they stumble towards the meat.

Everyone else sees joy. They see problems.

Noise

'Will you lot be quiet?' M'rand yells at the class.

_What are they laughing about? _Ralenth enquires.

_I wish I knew_. _And ask F'lar to fly past the windows in about ten minutes, would you?_

_I will. Everyone is quiet for F'lar._

In the time that conversation takes, the Weyrlings finish laughing and are looking everywhere but at each other. Fine. Let it stay like that. By the time F'lar comes, they're involved in their anatomy lesson.

It's three days before M'rand finds the re-written song shoved in amongst his papers, and two days before he stops grinning about it.

Children

_Do you mind, not siring a clutch? _M'rand asks Ralenth as they stand alongside the lake and watch F'lar assessing the latest Weyrlings. There's a big bronze there, so like Mnenementh that it seems to hurt him. No greying skin or thickened neck, no scarring. Perfection, carried on.

_Why should I? They are my queens, not my mates._

_Your clutches would have been an asset, _and M'rand wonders why he's feeling so wistful. _Sometimes, I wish..._

A young brown starts creeling; S'ran looks up and calls 'Sir!'

He runs. Ralenth hurries, saying quietly _we both have many children here, M'rand._

Partner

_Are you still busy?_ Ralenth asks softly. _The boys are all asleep now._

_Why aren't you?_

_A'lent's blue is itchy and Lamorth is feeling strange, but she doesn't know why._

_I'm coming,_ and he drops the notes, hurries through to the dragons. Ralenth is pacing up and down the aisle, stopping to touch noses with the young blue.

_Why didn't you call me earlier, you brown oaf?_

Ralenth nuzzles him. _They asked us to do this because we are a pair? I cannot do what you do, the writing, so I waited until that was done._

Together, they start work.


	2. March

Feast

The Weyrlings are sure that M'rand doesn't know about their late night feasts. They're also pretty sure that he doesn't know about the exchanges of chores, speculation about when they can go _between_ and the book on Ramoth's next clutch.

Ralenth rarely passes the gossip on. He doesn't need to. M'rand's learnt that dragons are nearly as bad as young riders at keeping secrets and normally asks them directly what's been happening.

M'rand also knows the loose stone they put the food behind, and wonders if it ever occurs to them that he was a weyrling, once upon a time.

Famine

_Ralenth!_

The brown swoops down in response to the mental shout, scatters dragons and people, restores calm by the time M'rand runs to the yard. But the dragons keen. A boy falls to the ground, screaming, and it's over, all over.

He'd not chopped the meat finely enough and blue Kalmareth had choked, or so M'rand guesses. The boy never speaks again, passes soon afterwards.

He persuades the rest of them to make up feeds, to not starve their dragons.

A Turn on, he thinks it's only him who remembers the blue and the boy who never got to ride.

Flying

They've grown so well and the weather's so calm that he starts flight training early.

Either Aranth hears it from Ralenth first, because the little blue's almost dancing on the spot, or J'kren's picked something up. The boy's observant for a blue.

M'rand watches through Ralenth's eyes, barely hearing J'kren's whoops of joy. His position's weak, arms crooked. His shoulders'll ache, flying like that.

_You're trembling_, Ralenth says afterwards. _Don't. We all know how to fly._

_Yes, but we don't_. He makes sure they're out of earshot before leaning against his dragon. _I still have nightmares about our first flight_.

Flight

Ralenth grumbles when M'rand wakes him and gives the co-ordinates for a particularly remote mountain.

_I've just eaten._

_Same. Come on. Quickly._

He's relieved when Ralenth lands and goes right back to sleep, apparently not having not noticed Pannath blooding her kills.

M'rand's never had a weyrmate, although Ralenth's got his favourites, and the green weyrlings tend to see them as a safe option. Pannath's rider might as well have moved into the teaching rooms for the amount of time he's spent there lately.

He never wants to wake up in bed with a former weyrling calling him 'Sir' again.


End file.
